Hawaii – Oahu
We travelled to visit Oahu for a few days recently. It was totally different than I expected. I thought it would all look like it does on the tv show ‘Lost’, which is filmed on this island.
But the mountains get about 160″ of rainfall a year. It falls off 10″/mile as you head out of the mountains. High in the mountains it is like a rainforest; down low it is like desert. I thought it would all be rainforest like. The north most beaches have large pines all over them, very much like Cape Cod but the pines are huge.
The beaches are gorgeous all around the island. On the south east side it is driest. There are several cities of tents along there some were quite big. Oahu has a very large poor population.
Some beaches are covered in white sand and some in volcanic rock. The water is so clear you can see bottom, even when the water is deep, 50′+. The water varies in shades of bright blue to greenish blue. The dark spots are volcanic rock under the water. There are whales and dolphins in the water.
There was far less wildlife than I expected. There are tons of wild of roosters and chickens, you can hear them everywhere you go. They sound more like song birds than poultry. There are some cardinals and a few other birds but not many species and not many of them. Most every critter is black, white or grey. However, there are a few critters with bright red on them.  No squirrels on the island. There are mongooses instead. They were brought in to control rats and mice, but they are awake during the day, and the rats and mice at night. You can see them slither past frequently and often hear them catch some poor bird that wasn’t paying attention.
We went to a luau one night. It was a lot of fun. They played Hawaiian music and we saw several of the local dances. Mostly we visited botanical gardens and hiked. We made it up Diamond Head one day. The mountains are all volcanic walls. So they are extremely steep and thin.
We visited several botanical gardens. I was encouraged since several of the plants are ones I grow or see about town. They too grow on sand and clay, so I might yet turn the backyard into a tropical garden. The plants are much larger there then they are here. I wouldn’t have thought they were the same plants if they hadn’t been tagged.
Honolulu is full of upscale stores, perhaps more than NYC. Behind the main street with all the fancy shops are flea market type shopping areas. In parts of Honolulu you could feel as if you were in NYC with all the tall buildings.
In the middle and north side of the island are the farms and plantations. The islands are about 3000 miles from anywhere.  I think I’d start feeling very claustrophobic if I was living there.
